Brody hits paydirt with Juno nod

Country singer Dean Brody wraps up a cross-Canada tour playing Centre 200 in Sydney on Thursday and Casino Nova Scotia in Halifax on Saturday. (CONTRIBUTED)

There are good weeks, then there are great weeks and Canadian country singer Dean Brody is definitely having one of the latter.

On Tuesday, Brody saw his third album Dirt, which previously earned a cluster of Canadian Country Music Awards, land among the Juno Awards’ country album of the year nominees.

In addition, this week he’s wrapping up his first headlining cross-Canada tour on home turf in Nova Scotia, just a short drive away from his home on the South Shore.

“I’ve been so fortunate, 2012 was a great year,” says the British Columbia-raised performer.

He appears Thursday at Centre 200 in Sydney and has two shows on Saturday at Halifax’s Casino Nova Scotia (4 p.m., all ages, and 8 p.m., 19+).

“Those awards shows are daunting,” he says. “I don’t know that any of us really look forward to performing on them. They’re really for the industry, and there’s this frantic pace of the production behind the scenes.

“But as far as the awards themselves go, … to get voted on and selected by your peers, people I’ve respected for years in music, for them to give you the nod and say, ‘Yeah, we believe in your songwriting and what you do as an artist,’ it’s a big thing. It’s very encouraging.”

Brody was certainly a dominating factor at last September’s Canadian Country Music Awards show in Saskatoon. He opened the production with his hit single Canadian Girls and earned album and male artist of the year for Dirt.

The record also picked up a CCMA for album design of the year, while Brody’s guitarist Jason Barry was named as a winner of a 2012 CCMA All-Star Band Award.

He must be looking forward to welcoming his hurtin’ song-singing and guitar-picking friends to his new adopted home when the CCMAs come to Nova Scotia in 2015.

“The weekend is so jammed full of things,” he says. “I think the best part of the weekend is after the awards show … you can just hang out and have a great time. I remember going to a bar (in Saskatoon) with Alan Doyle and Alan Hawco and my producer and the band and just hanging out.

“That to me is what it’s all about, being with other artists who understand what you do and what it’s like to be a musician and live that life. That’s the highlight of those weekends, connecting with all the people that are becoming my friends now, having that community is important.”

Besides his expressive voice and boy-next-door affability, Brody is also blessed with considerable songwriting skills, as displayed by the four singles spawned by Dirt so far.

He cut his teeth in Nashville with his first two albums, a self-titled debut and the Juno-nominated followup Trail in Life.

But Brody didn’t want to stick to the songwriting formulas dictated by the nature of the business in country’s capital. So on Dirt, he goes from straight-up honky-tonk to a pub singalong with Great Big Sea and a tribute to Jamaican music icon Bob Marley.

So perhaps its variety that’s the spice of Dirt’s success.

“Maybe it is the diversity,” he reasons. “One thing I was scared of when I became a recording artist is that I don’t write this one particular (way). I have ADHD when it comes to songwriting. I like trying to write a reggae song, or being challenged by trying to write an East Coast kind of song with It’s Friday.

“Then there’s an almost psychedelic ’70s kind of vibe with this epic song, Nowhere U.S.A. It’s almost Dwight Yoakam or Chris Isaak-ish.

“I love taking those steps outside of the box, and what I’ve found is that my fans allow me to do that, and I appreciate it so much. I’d hate having to write the same kind of song album after album.”

That musical approach should also make for an entertaining show as he wraps up his first headlining tour, a milestone he’s been looking forward to since he first picked up a guitar while working at a Kootenay Valley, B.C., sawmill in his teens.

“It was kind of ironic, because I was just in L.A. doing a video with Terri Clark for a song we did on her Classic record,” says Brody, referring to their duet on I’m Movin’ On by that famous son of the South Shore, Hank Snow.

“Terri took me out across Canada for the first time, so seeing her a week before heading out on my own tour was cool. It’s wild how time flies, and it changes things and here we are about to head out into these venues.

“I remember at the time thinking how amazing it was that Terri had these whole theatres full of people coming out to see her, thinking it would be incredible if that ever happened down the road in my career.

“I’m a little nervous about it all, but I think I’m more excited about getting out there and connecting with fans in an intimate theatre setting.”

Brody will be joined by up-and-coming N.S. singer-songwriter Dylan Guthro at Sydney’s Centre 200, where tickets are $34.50 and $46 at the box office (564-2200) and tickets.capebreton.ca.

His Saturday night show in Casino Nova Scotia’s Schooner Room is sold out, but tickets for the 4 p.m. all-ages show are still available for $35 and $45 at the casino’s guest services counter, the Ticket Atlantic box office (451-1221 or www.ticketatlantic.com) and Atlantic Superstore outlets. Doors open 45 minutes before show time.